


He Had Great Trouble Admitting Defeat to a Coffee Machine

by imkerfuffled



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, References some of Howard's inventions from Agent Carter, Tony stark has very strange kitchen appliances
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-01
Updated: 2015-03-01
Packaged: 2018-03-15 17:46:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3456191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imkerfuffled/pseuds/imkerfuffled
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve is new to the tower, and Tony leaves him alone with the coffee machine and only the vaguest of instructions on how to use it. Things do not go well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	He Had Great Trouble Admitting Defeat to a Coffee Machine

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by a tumblr writeworld prompt, which is also where I got the title from.

Steve refused to believe this… _thing_ was a coffee machine. It was far too large, far too complex, and had far too many buttons to function as a device that produced coffee. 

It also knew his name. Sort of. 

He glared one more time at the tiny holographic display that had popped up above what he thought might be the lid, the words, “Hello Captain Spangles” scrolling across it in green letters every four seconds. 

Typical Stark. 

The idiot had abandoned him with the empty, vaguely cube-shaped machine (last time Steve checked, coffee machines were never meant to be cube-shaped) and instructions to, “just use the keyboard.” 

Steve’s shouted, “There _is_ no keyboard!” fell on an empty doorway. 

Normally, if left alone with any piece of unidentified technology owned by a Stark, Steve would run in the opposite direction—he hadn’t forgotten what happened with Howard’s so-called back massager yet. But right now Steve was starving and exhausted and he wanted a coffee goddammit, so this stupid machine would have to do. 

He started by hitting it to see if that did anything, which was what Howard always did when one of his inventions was being uncooperative. Nothing happened. Either this Stark had developed a better way of diagnosing a problem, or his machines were simply damage-proof. Steve wasn’t sure which he would prefer at the moment. 

Next he tried glaring at it again, on the chance that it would sense his disapproval and fix itself. 

Steve never really expected that to work. (Although, Stark _had_ managed to get his giant mechanical arm to drop a fire extinguisher earlier by aggressively pointing at it, so maybe it wasn’t so far-fetched to try glaring at the not-coffee machine.) 

Finally, he pressed an experimental button. Steve had left this idea, which under normal circumstances would be the reasonable first choice, for last due to a sense of self-preservation. He had far too much experience with the Stark inventive style to think pushing random buttons would be a good idea. The last time someone tried that, it released a deadly poison into the SSR lab, and Howard wouldn’t speak to any of the Commandos for a week, even though, as Bucky pointed out, “none of this would have happened if you’d made a damn kill switch.” Nobody died, luckily, but Steve knew better than to push his luck this time. 

Again, nothing appeared to happen. That didn’t mean it couldn’t blow up any second now, though. 

Steve pushed another button. 

The holographic letters turned red white and blue, and it started beeping to the tune of the national anthem. 

He would have preferred an explosion. 

Steve tried shouting at it. He tried waving his hands in front of it and covering up the holograph with his arm. He tried humming along in an obnoxious, off-key voice. It did nothing to make the machine stop. 

He tried pushing another button, and patriotic confetti burst from the lid. 

Steve faceplanted on the counter. A side panel popped open and inflated a blue balloon, which drifted serenely to the ceiling. 

At that point, Steve gave a yell that was vaguely reminiscent of Captain Kirk shouting _“KHAN!”_ in the old Star Trek movie, except Steve was shouting _“STARK!”_

Soon, he became aware that somebody else had entered the room and could see him screaming at the ceiling. He spun around. 

It was Pepper, regarding him with an expression that held a mixture of concern, wariness, and _dear-god-what-has-Tony-done-this-time_ , which somehow managed to be a recognizable emotion. Suddenly, Steve felt very very embarrassed. 

“Is everything all right?” Pepper asked. 

“Er…” Steve looked down at his confetti-covered shoes, turned beet red, and mumbled a response. “I was trying to get the coffee machine to work.” 

Now Pepper just looked confused. “That?” she pointed to the singing monstrosity on the counter. 

Steve nodded.

“That is _not_ the coffee machine,” she said. _“This_ is.” The object she pointed to sat on the opposite end of the counter and looked very much like a normal coffee machine, except with more chrome and buttons. And a keyboard. 

“I don’t know what the hell _that_ is supposed to be.”

**Author's Note:**

> Meanwhile JARVIS is being a little shit and recording all of this.


End file.
